Everytime I see another story of a priest abusing children while the Catholic Church hierarchy swept it under the rug, I get so furious and wonder if I'm in the "right" religion (not that I think there's a "wrong" religion). There are so many things I love about the Catholic Church - the church of my mother and my childhood. For example, I love the beautiful rituals and images which have been familiar to me since I was a child and I love the fact that we worship women (Mary and women saints). What I do not love is the hypocrisy of priests being our conduits to God (and His instruments in the Sacrament of Reconciliation) when they are just human beings like the rest of us and, obviously, some as imperfect as the rest of us. I also do not love the audacity of the bishops and cardinals who decided (and are probably still deciding) that it is better to protect a pedophile than to help a child. It's hard to reconcile all of this. Do others feel this way, too?

I'm not Catholic, but I left the church-going gig for similar reasons. However, to be fair, maybe it'd help if you realize that Christianity (or any religion, for that matter) isn't a magic transformation machine. Bear with me, as I know from experience this will anger a few people, but religious places are clubs. They can't magically poof people into righteousness. It's just a get-together for people who prefer one god over another. As such, people will be who they are regardless. All you have to do is decide whether you like attending that particular club.

Knock and the door shall open. It's not my fault if you don't like the decor.

Definitely, Mary, I also find these sex abuse scandals really distressing, and the disappointments are more profound when our bishops fail to take action. And you know this one too, but yeah, our priests and bishops are human and they sin. But our Church doesn’t fail because this bishop failed to take action. In terms of sin I’m definitely talking about something different from sexual abuse or protecting the abusers, but consider Christ’s apostles, from whom the Church has received Apostolic Succession. Peter of all people denied Jesus three times when He died. Now Peter was understandably afraid of acknowledging his association with Christ (can’t blame him, can we?), but he should’ve been with Christ, because a few female disciples were at the Crucifixion. In spite of that cop out, Peter remained an apostle and the “Rock.”

And just because, as you say, the priests are sinners like us laypeople, doesn’t mean there is “hypocrisy” doing Confession. Look at the legacy of Baptism, which washes our sins and is representative of our new life in the church. Jesus, the perfect, sinless Son of Man, was baptized by John, a sinner. And therefore we don’t baptize ourselves to wash our sins – it is done by a priest (or in an emergency, by any person of sound mind), likewise, a sinner. Furthermore, Confession is something of a mirror to, where Levite priests are involved in the arrangement of Israeli’s sin offerings: again sinners on both sides.

We really need to pray harder for our Church, for each other, for the victims, and for the enemies. We need to remember that people are good, and I disagree with Iwantamotto in that sometimes you can chose to improve yourself by your faith, but I agree with her in that yeah, people can and believe me they will hurt you, and we can’t forget that for a second. We have to speak at the right time and way so that we’ll be smart and keep our eyes open for dangers. And knowing there will be dangers, we must more than anything be prepared to (yeah, I know everybody says it) forgive (though never forget).

Just to correct your terms, we venerate but we never “worship” either Mary or the saints. We venerate them.

Everytime I see another story of a priest abusing children while the Catholic Church hierarchy swept it under the rug, I get so furious and wonder if I'm in the "right" religion (not that I think there's a "wrong" religion). There are so many things I love about the Catholic Church - the church of my mother and my childhood. For example, I love the beautiful rituals and images which have been familiar to me since I was a child and I love the fact that we worship women (Mary and women saints). What I do not love is the hypocrisy of priests being our conduits to God (and His instruments in the Sacrament of Reconciliation) when they are just human beings like the rest of us and, obviously, some as imperfect as the rest of us. I also do not love the audacity of the bishops and cardinals who decided (and are probably still deciding) that it is better to protect a pedophile than to help a child. It's hard to reconcile all of this. Do others feel this way, too?

There are several active threads on this topic on the Discuss Catholicism board that you might be interested in reading.

Everytime I see another story of a priest abusing children while the Catholic Church hierarchy swept it under the rug, I get so furious and wonder if I'm in the "right" religion (not that I think there's a "wrong" religion). There are so many things I love about the Catholic Church - the church of my mother and my childhood. For example, I love the beautiful rituals and images which have been familiar to me since I was a child and I love the fact that we worship women (Mary and women saints). What I do not love is the hypocrisy of priests being our conduits to God (and His instruments in the Sacrament of Reconciliation) when they are just human beings like the rest of us and, obviously, some as imperfect as the rest of us. I also do not love the audacity of the bishops and cardinals who decided (and are probably still deciding) that it is better to protect a pedophile than to help a child. It's hard to reconcile all of this. Do others feel this way, too?

As another person already pointed out, we do not worship Mary nor the Saints. Worshipping them puts them on par with God, and that is contrary to the first commandment.

The sex abuse that has been coming out has been terrible to watch. We always want to think of our leaders as being perfect or sinless...obviously as it is said in Romans, everyone is a sinner. We need to remember though that the Catholic Church has never taught that its church leaders are perfect. They have only taught that that the Church teaches infallibly in terms of faith and morals when it teaches in its official capacity.

One thing I have noticed is the media blitz on the Catholic Church. If you pay attention to the media, you would begin to think that the Church was filled with all these sex-abusing priests and that all the bishops and cardinals hid it. The reality is that there is no proof or fact that the sex-abuse rate among this celibacy priesthood is higher than married men. The reality is that there are only a precious few bad apples who make the church look out to be a whorehouse. Yes, the sex-abuse is all over the papers.....that does not mean it is all over the church.

The reality is that the media is very anti-Catholic (notice the attention public school sex abuse gets even though it is more rampent than the Catholic sex abuse)...so any bad apple will be magnified over a hundred times.

The reality is that while many priests and bishops made terrible decisions (even decisions that were consistent with the thinking of the time that sexual abusers could be rehabilitated), there are so many more good priests and bishops out there who have shone like Christ in their work. The next time you read or hear about a sex abuse scandal, remember you are hearing about a great minority....and not the great majority.

The Church is surviving this scandal. Many will leave the Church for it. However they are leaving Peter for Judas, and they are not leaving in a rational and logistical manner.

Everytime I see another story of a priest abusing children while the Catholic Church hierarchy swept it under the rug, I get so furious and wonder if I'm in the "right" religion (not that I think there's a "wrong" religion). There are so many things I love about the Catholic Church - the church of my mother and my childhood. For example, I love the beautiful rituals and images which have been familiar to me since I was a child and I love the fact that we worship women (Mary and women saints). What I do not love is the hypocrisy of priests being our conduits to God (and His instruments in the Sacrament of Reconciliation) when they are just human beings like the rest of us and, obviously, some as imperfect as the rest of us. I also do not love the audacity of the bishops and cardinals who decided (and are probably still deciding) that it is better to protect a pedophile than to help a child. It's hard to reconcile all of this. Do others feel this way, too?

As another person already pointed out, we do not worship Mary nor the Saints. Worshipping them puts them on par with God, and that is contrary to the first commandment.

The sex abuse that has been coming out has been terrible to watch. We always want to think of our leaders as being perfect or sinless...obviously as it is said in Romans, everyone is a sinner. We need to remember though that the Catholic Church has never taught that its church leaders are perfect. They have only taught that that the Church teaches infallibly in terms of faith and morals when it teaches in its official capacity.

One thing I have noticed is the media blitz on the Catholic Church. If you pay attention to the media, you would begin to think that the Church was filled with all these sex-abusing priests and that all the bishops and cardinals hid it. The reality is that there is no proof or fact that the sex-abuse rate among this celibacy priesthood is higher than married men. The reality is that there are only a precious few bad apples who make the church look out to be a whorehouse. Yes, the sex-abuse is all over the papers.....that does not mean it is all over the church.

The reality is that the media is very anti-Catholic (notice the attention public school sex abuse gets even though it is more rampent than the Catholic sex abuse)...so any bad apple will be magnified over a hundred times.

The reality is that while many priests and bishops made terrible decisions (even decisions that were consistent with the thinking of the time that sexual abusers could be rehabilitated), there are so many more good priests and bishops out there who have shone like Christ in their work. The next time you read or hear about a sex abuse scandal, remember you are hearing about a great minority....and not the great majority.

The Church is surviving this scandal. Many will leave the Church for it. However they are leaving Peter for Judas, and they are not leaving in a rational and logistical manner.

What a bizarre reaction. It isn't just the scandal that is driving peope out either: it is the rigidity of those prelates stuck in the mire of what was, not what is.

Wavering's suggestion about the Discuss Catholicism board is totally on target.

Regarding worshipping Jesus Mother Mary the Blessed Mother, remember before He died in the cross Jesus told the apostles to see after His Mother......In my opinion, when Jesus said that the best way to pray is to pray to "Our Father In Heaven", this is the way Jesus follows the very 1st Commandment...In the 3rd Commandment - Honor Thy Father and Thy Mother.....Jesus honors His Mother, and most especially God the Father... especially before He died on the cross.....We need to follow Jesus example worshipping God the Father and honoring or worshiping His mother the Blessed Mary.......

I was raised Catholic, but I also go to other churches.......A friend of mine invited one of her catholic friends to go to a singles function in her church....They got a ride back home, but on the way, one of the passengers in the car told my friends friend that she's catholic` and she believes in the Blessed Mary....in a mocking way....When this other passenger did this my friend was so upset with him that she stopped going to her church......Why is it that a lot of so called christians dont believe in the Blessed Mary?......Without Mary we wont have Jesus......

The reality is that while many priests and bishops made terrible decisions (even decisions that were consistent with the thinking of the time that sexual abusers could be rehabilitated), there are so many more good priests and bishops out there who have shone like Christ in their work. The next time you read or hear about a sex abuse scandal, remember you are hearing about a great minority....and not the great majority."

I agree. And I would also add that Protestant churches have their own scandals, sexual and otherwise. Ted Haggard is one example, Jimmy Swaggart, Jim Baker, and others. Those are just a drop in the bucket. How about the ones that don't have a TV show, and aren't worldly popular? Because we are sinful humans, there will be scandals everywhere, so leaving the Mother Church for a denominational (or "non-denominational") church is to go from one set of problems to another.

Mary,

Re: original post - confessing to a priest is logical to me. It is biblical - "Confess your sins to one another...." and also logical in the sense that we don't confess to a mediator, but to the office of the priest. A person who has been given the keys of the Kingdom to bind and loosen, to forgive. No we don't have to confess to a priest, but I don't think formal confessionals are a bad thing either.....

Everytime I see another story of a priest abusing children while the Catholic Church hierarchy swept it under the rug, I get so furious and wonder if I'm in the "right" religion (not that I think there's a "wrong" religion). There are so many things I love about the Catholic Church - the church of my mother and my childhood. For example, I love the beautiful rituals and images which have been familiar to me since I was a child and I love the fact that we worship women (Mary and women saints). What I do not love is the hypocrisy of priests being our conduits to God (and His instruments in the Sacrament of Reconciliation) when they are just human beings like the rest of us and, obviously, some as imperfect as the rest of us. I also do not love the audacity of the bishops and cardinals who decided (and are probably still deciding) that it is better to protect a pedophile than to help a child. It's hard to reconcile all of this. Do others feel this way, too?

You aren't in the right religion if you are worshipping Mary, you aren't Catholic if you are worshipping anyone other than God

Just saying.

So either you're posing as a Catholic or you don't know the tenants of your own faith. The first one is really sketchy and falls in the category of lying which is a sin, the second we can work through. Which is it?